Customer Reviews

The Temple

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This simply told but sincere and intelligent story captured me. So much has been written on the subject of Germany, before, during, and after World War II... I felt relieved but also invited by the apparent simplicity of the text. It betrays the underlying emotions and discoveries, which are poignant and real, and brings the experiences of a different time closer. I was reminded of the temporal, fragile nature of every human constellation, be it family or friends, so it makes sense that I found the book in my stair well... Finally, it was very refreshing to read a nonpolitical, nonmoralizing book on the experiences of a young gay man, focusing on the human traits of emotions, a sense of belonging, and friendship. Especially the description of the fascination with health and the body as a machine at that time should be pertinent for our culture at present.

While some people may find The Temple flawed, I was quite touched by its vividness and immediacy. Especially in the first part, it made me feel like I was there in 1929 Germany enjoying that summer with the tremendous intensity and uncertainty of youth that Spender so beautifully captures. Yes, there isn't much of a plot and the writing is uneven, but this is all about recording the experience, fictional though it may be, and The Temple succeeds spectacularly at doing that.

The second part takes place in the winter of 1932 when the Nazis are about to take power. Spender contrasts the freedom of the Weimar Republic with the oppression of the Third Reich by depicting 1929 in Summer light while the impending darkness of the Nazi's rise in late 1932 occurs in gloomy wet weather mostly in the dark. This not-too-original technique works for me even if it is obvious. Paul, the English narrator of the story observes the rise of the Nazis without fully accepting its reality, and the German characters are either in total denial or casting their lot with the Nazis, whom they can see are going to prevail. It's all too believable.

So for me, The Temple is a big thumbs up. It's intensity and immediacy more than make up for its flaws in style, pacing, and plot.

I read Stephen Spender's The Temple many years ago, when it first came out. It is an absolutely unique work, in that he wrote part of it back in the early 30s when the storm clouds were forming over Germany -- and then finished and polished it in the 80s, once one could look back on the whole of the 30s and 40s with a more objective eye.

He is also just such a wonderful writer - beautiful prose, lovingly rendered. I am sure that anyone with a fine eye for elegant prose will love this book as I did!

Despite the "hot" cover and interesting historical period involved, this book is actually quite dull and poorly written. Spender is known as a poet and memoirist, not a novelist. There is no narrative pace, the characters are thinly drawn, and the plot is meandering. It is interesting as an artifact in the Auden-Isherwood-Spender literary history, for those who care, not as a novel in itself. Let the reader be warned.